October Square (Minsk)
| Oktoberplatz | |
|---|---|
 |
|
 Palace of the Republic on October Square in Minsk |
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| Basic data | |
| place | Minsk |
| District | Zentralny Rajon |
| Confluent streets | Independence Boulevard, Engelsstrasse, Strasse der Internationale |
| Buildings | Republic Square |
| use | |
| User groups | Shows, concerts, political events, demonstrations |
The October Square ( Belarusian плошча Кастрычніцкая , Kastrytschnizkaja ploschtscha ; Russian площадь Октябрьская , Oktyabrskaya ploschtschad ) is a centrally located place in the Belarusian capital Minsk .
Like a number of other cities in the former Soviet Union , the square was named after the October Revolution of 1917. Among other things, the Palace of the Republic is located on Oktoberplatz , where political events take place in addition to shows and concerts. After the presidential elections in 2006, numerous rallies took place on the square , at which opposition supporters accused President Lukashenka, who has been in office since 1994, of manipulating.
The two lines of the Minsk metro intersect under Oktoberplatz . There are the stations Kastrytschnizkaja (Russian. Oktjabrskaja ) of the "blue" Maskouskaja line (opened 1984) and Kupalauskaja (Kupalowskaja) of the "red" Autasavodskaja line (opened 1990).
On April 11, 2011, there was a bomb attack at Kastrychnitskaya station . Fifteen people died and over two hundred were injured. President Lukashenka used the police investigations that followed to suspect opposition groups; In 2012, two confessed suspects were executed. Previously, there had been massive protests from Western countries against the executions, as some of the confessions had been extracted using torture.
The author Martin von Arndt addressed the political situation in Belarus and the Belarusian opposition in a novel published in 2012 (entitled “Oktoberplatz”).
Web links
Coordinates: 53 ° 54 ′ 8 ″ N , 27 ° 33 ′ 42 ″ E